Jefferson Parish President Aaron Broussard walked into his executive offices in the Joseph S. Yenni Building in Elmwood on Friday morning and greeted his staff with his usual handshakes and hugs.

"He was cheerful and making jokes," Chief Administrative Officer Jose Gonzalez said. "He just sounded like the typical Aaron Broussard."

Within an hour Broussard had left the building, only to call back and stun his top aides gathered around a speaker phone: He resigned effective at 6 p.m.

For a man who has rarely avoided the public spotlight, Broussard chose a remarkably quiet exit from a political career that spanned 35 years, included an aborted run for governor in 1991 and made him one of the most familiar faces in what is now Louisiana's most populous parish.

Having successfully weathered both the political and the very real maelstroms of Hurricane Katrina, Broussard, 61, quit amid a growing scandal that erupted in October and seemed to peak Monday when his embattled chief administrative officer, Tim Whitmer, resigned under the pressure of a federal criminal investigation.

"The ongoing controversial issues that began several months ago, and continue today, requiring my immediate reaction, have rendered me seriously limited in my ability to be effective in my normal duties as parish president," Broussard said in a written statement that his office released.

A telephone message left for him went unanswered. No one answered the door at his Kenner house, and there were no signs of activity there all afternoon.

After the loss of the administration's top two executives in less than a week, Parish Council members worked to reassure the public that the government will continue to function uninterrupted.

"Our job is to make sure the government runs and doesn't miss a beat," Councilman Tom Capella said. "The freezing temperatures coming in present some challenges, but we're ready for it."

Under the parish's charter, Gonzalez will serve in Broussard's stead until the council chooses an interim parish president. The seven-member council has 30 days to make a decision, but it could come as soon as Wednesday, its next scheduled meeting.

"I was just appointed CAO yesterday, and all of sudden I'm going to be acting parish president for a few days,'' said Gonzalez, previously the public works director but now in charge of all 3,000 parish employees and a half-billion-dollar budget. "It came as a surprise, but I can do it.''

Broussard has taken flak for myriad controversies that began with Whitmer's company, Lagniappe Industries, which the news media has reported was doing business with government agencies and Jefferson Parish contractors. Broussard himself admitted he did $5,000 of "legal work" for the company and referred potential clients its way.

He also caused public outcry for providing Whitmer and other top executives with exceptional raises as his second and final term was coming to an end. Had he not resigned, term limits would have forced Broussard from office in 2012.

And in late December, The Times-Picayune disclosed that 47 Broussard directors and staffers had been asked to pitch in $100 each, a Christmas gift drive that culminated in Broussard receiving a $4,500 travel voucher and a $200 restaurant gift certificate.

Michael DeMocker/The Times-Picayune archiveAaron Broussard has said he will challenge any allegations that he rented a cabin he owns in Nova Scotia, Canada, to contractors.

Even as Broussard was announcing his retirement Friday, a federal grand jury was receiving new evidence in the Lagniappe Industries investigation. It collected documents on River Birch Inc., the company that owns a Waggaman landfill, recently won a $6.4-million, 25-year contract from the parish and uses Lagniappe as the insurance agency for its employees. Broussard's administrators, including Whitmer and Parish Attorney Tom Wilkinson, were central figures in the negotiations that landed River Birch that deal.

Crime Commission President Rafael Goyeneche said such ethics inquiries take many months to complete and almost never result in something as dramatic as the resignation of a parish president.

"I've filed dozens of ethics complaints over the years, and I've never had anyone resign because of an ethics complaint," Goyeneche said. "It doesn't logically register that this ethics complaint was the reason for his resignation."

"He said he has not been told that he is the target of any investigation," said Smith, who was present for Broussard's call Friday morning. "He said he is resigning on his own terms for the good of the parish and the administration."

Matthew Hinton / The Times-PicayuneBroussard speaks to reporters Monday after his chief administrative officer, Tim Whitmer, resigned.Broussard has been in the vise of public resentment before. After Katrina, more than 49,000 residents signed an unsuccessful petition to throw him out of office. His administration had evacuated drainage pump operators to Washington Parish, leaving thousands of homes to flood in the surge of the 2005 storm.

He defended the decision, saying it might have saved pump operators' lives. He was sued, labeled a pariah and faced dim prospects for re-election in 2007.

But he revised the evacuation plan, armored the pump stations with local money and squeaked out a victory, defeating two opponents with most of his support coming from the West Bank.

"Very seldom have I seen him run from a fight," said Parish Councilman Elton Lagasse, who has known Broussard since teaching him at Kenner Junior High School in the 1960s. "I was very surprised to see him resign."

So was almost everyone else at the Yenni Building on Friday.

While virtually all there seemed to agree it was a sad day for Jefferson Parish, the sorrow was mixed with a palpable sense of relief after weeks of regular news stories raising ethical questions about Whitmer and Broussard.

"The constant daily pounding of accusations about what they might have done is going to ease up," Lagasse said. "I told Aaron that I'm disappointed about his resignation, but I'm glad because I think this is going to allow us to regroup and restore the public's faith in parish government."